Mathos Stone
Mathos Stone is a royal bastard of King Andar II Arryn, the former Master of the Bloody Gate, and is now a recruit for the Night's Watch. Appearance Mathos has green eyes, short brown hair, and a scruffy beard. He is of an average size and build for someone that would be a knight or a warrior. He is sometimes seen with him the round, detailed valyrian steel shield of House Arryn, but he usually uses a normal wooden shield. Mathos will often been seen standing towards the outside of a group of people, and is rarely at the center of attention. Biography Mathos Stone was born in 269 AA, the illegitimate bastard of King Andar II. His parents met each other during Andar’s campaign against the mountain clansmen. Mathos’s mother, Mya, was a smallfolk from Gulltown who joined the army as a healer. After the war, she helped heal a serious injury King Andar received during the final conflict. Andar was trained to be honorable and celibate until marriage, but despite his better judgement the two became very close friends. For a while it stayed that way, merely a friendship between a young maiden and a King who loved his people. Many nobles questioned Andar’s closeness with a smallfolk such as her, but he didn’t care. Overtime the friendship turned into infatuation. Finally, three years after meeting each other, Mya bore Andar a child named Mathos. His lover realized that such a child would only bring shame to him, and so once she realized she became pregnant, she informed her lover and left for Gulltown. Mathos was lovingly raised by Mya, and was told that his father had died before he was born. As far as the young child knew, he was just another smallfolk. While Mya kept Mathos’s heritage a secret, she made no secret of her past as a healer with the Knights of the Vale. Her tales enthralled the young boy, who idolized the honor, loyalty, and strength of these brave men. He grew up training with swords, hoping to one day become Ser Mathos, and fight the wildlings who terrorized the Kingdom. When he was only nine years of age, Mathos’s mother got ill from a plague. She started to become more and more of an invalid, until she couldn’t take care of Mathos anymore. A friend of hers, a dock worker named Hugh, began to take care of Mathos now. He was told to tell her son about his true parentage once she was gone, and to bring him to the Eyrie. After a few more weeks of sickness she passed away, and Hugh kept his word. When Mathos came to the Eyrie, Andar was apprehensive to take in the bastard, knowing how much it would damage his reputation. Still, when he looked into Mathos’s bright green eyes he saw Mya in them, and fell in love with the boy. He already had one son, and his wife just gave birth to a daughter, but Andar and Queen Elinor decided to raise him as one of their own. As Robar and Jeyne were both much younger than Mathos, he looked after them and cared for them as they started to grow. When Jon was born a couple years after Mathos came to the Eyrie, he too was partially raised by Mathos. The royal bastard certainly felt like he didn’t belong, but he was still treated as family, and treated his siblings well. He especially became close to Jeyne, who had in a sense joined the family around the time he did. As he started to grow older and more capable, Mathos kept hoping to prove himself to be an honorable warrior, like the Knights of the Vale he had loved hearing stories about. Andar saw how his son was becoming a strong believer in the Valeman culture and his enthusiasm for being a Knight, and so he convinced his cousin Ser Lyonel Arryn into taking Mathos as a squire. Ser Lyonel was already getting old, and he held the Gates of the Moon which wasn’t too close to any mountain clans activity. Still, Mathos revelled in the opportunity. While living at the Gates of the Moon for a couple years to squire for Lyonel, Mathos often went hunting in the mountains. He enjoyed the solitude of his trips, and grew to be quite capable at stalking deer, boar, and other animals. What he loved most about his trips hunting in the mountains though, wasn’t the solitude or the game, it was being in the expansive and towering peaks that protected the Vale, and bred the culture he steeped himself in. Once he returned to the Eyrie, he found that his siblings, while young, weren’t just small children anymore. He also found that as he had now become a man, he was treated differently by the family. He was still loved, but he was always on the outside. A royal bastard accepted into the household of his King, was still a bastard after all, and could never hope to be one of the family. Mathos came to accept this, and started seeking more solitude. He wished to blend into the background of things, and the dream of being knighted slipped away as he sought to avoid the spotlight. Five years passed since Mathos had stopped being a squire and had become a man. He was a capable fighter and warrior, and eager to seek honor for himself. Then the War of the Trident broke out, and he had the opportunity to do just that. While his father was forbid Robar to join him in the war, and ordered him to stay in the Eyrie, Mathos was older and had proven himself to be capable. So, he rode out for the Trident with the army of House Arryn. Mathos’ primary job in the army was fortifying the camps. He got good at knowing how to set up barricades, scouting perimeters, trenches, and more. Despite being part of the Arryn army, Mathos never got into any of the actual fighting. His father didn’t want to lose him, and so during skirmishes Andar put him in charge of reserve forces, which were rarely used. During the siege of Harrenhal there was little conflict too, so he took up scouting when he wasn’t working on defenses. When the final battle of the war broke out at the Stoney Sept, Mathos felt he finally had a chance to fight and prove his loyalty and honor. As he sat in charge of the reserves, he kept waiting for them to be used, but in the end the Valemen lost, and the reserves were used merely to help the fleeing forces escape. He returned to the Eyrie still not a warrior, and with a brother he loved dearly now dead. Andar saw that his bastard son was feeling disappointed by having been stuck in the reserves for the war, and so decided to give him a very prestigious position. He appointed Mathos as the commander of the Bloody Gate. For the next five years he would guard the gate between the plains outside the mountains of the moon, and the road that led to the seat of House Arryn. Not much happened during his time as commander of the Bloody Gate, but he did prove himself to be a very authoritative commander. The men under him obeyed his every word, and he found himself well respected by the soldiers that protected the road. Still, it wasn’t quite enough, and Mathos yearned for the chance to gain honor in combat and become a true, prestigious man like the famous knights of the Vale. His chance finally came during the recent Council of Harrenhal. As the Sword of the Morning asked the Kings there to send men to aid the Night’s Watch, Andar Arryn thought of his son and decided it was a perfect opportunity for him. When Mathos heard of the idea of joining the watch, he lept on it. He could prove his honor without winning glory and praise, and he could protect the realms of men from wildlings, just as the Knights of the Vale had done for centuries. As a final parting gift before Mathos left for the Wall, King Andar II gave him the valyrian steel shield of House Arryn, Swordbreaker. Now Mathos is almost at the Wall, ready to join the Watch and defeat the traitors of the King on the Wall. Timeline 269 - Mathos Stone, Andar’s bastard, is born in Gulltown. 276 - Mathos begins training with the sword, hoping to become a Knight of the Vale. 278 - Mathos Stone goes to the Eyrie after his mother dies. 284 - Mathos becomes a squire for Ser Lyonel Arryn. 286 - Mathos returns to the Eyrie. 291 - The Vale invades the Trident, and Mathos helps fortify the army’s camps. 293 - Mathos is put in charge of the Eyrie’s guards. 298 - Mathos goes up North to help the Night’s Watch. Category:Valeman Category:The Night's Watch